


over the mountains

by CouldCareLess



Category: Naruto
Genre: a sort of reincarnation story ig??, don't expect anything huhu, i was very young when i wrote it okay, the characters aren't rlly given any deep meaning tho
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-14
Updated: 2020-06-14
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:35:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24723916
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CouldCareLess/pseuds/CouldCareLess
Summary: It never does get any easier.
Kudos: 1





	over the mountains

**Author's Note:**

> so uhm. hi. my grammar sucks but my writing is much worse, sadly. i'd call it very edgy but i'm not rlly sure if that's the right term? *shrug* keep an open mind ig thank youuu

_ There is beauty to be found in life _ , she thought to herself, each word foreign and rather impossible to believe in.

This is the past: laughter, high and beautiful, yet deep and calming. War drums ominously beat in the distance.

...This is the present: sword in her hands and blood on her lips. The drums have never been louder.

Why does she fight still?

Wouldn't it be easier to just stop?

She paused, slightly lowering her sword before—

This is war, and there is no time left for wishful thinking.

(Maybe, just maybe...)

And then, she didn't have to think anymore.

_ I'm sorry. _

.

.

.

.

.

She goes by Tachibana Kazuko now. Not only that, but she has a family this time around. They may not be the richest, nor the poorest but that's okay.

She was born to Tachibana Daichi and Tomoko, both chūnin, a few years after the end of the Second Shinobi War.

...It is a time of "peace.”

The knowledge fills her with a joy that thrums deep within her bones and a laughter that’s too innocent to be hers.

Well, no, not really.

(Peace is but a lie—everyone knows that such a thing does not exist. Maybe, just maybe it wouldn't be anything but the truth; but now?

...They are shinobi.

What is a shinobi if it is not a weapon?)

  
.  
  


There are whispers of "prodigy" being passed around. Carefully, she does not think of the many who were bestowed such a title in the past.

(The Snake Sannin Orochimaru—mad.

Hatake Sakumo—dead by suicide.

Hatake Kakashi—dysfunctional to an unbelieveable degree.

...Uchiha Itachi—anbu captain at thirteen.)

Her smile falters at each whisper.

She graduated at the age of nine, just months before the Uchiha Massacre.

She fails the final graduation test, and the whispers finally stop.

  
.  
  


Daichi Tachibana was a chūnin, quiet and unassuming. A little nice but easily forgettable and why wouldn't he be?

There are many more chūnin who are better and well-known.

What they forget is this: of all the high-level chūnin in Konoha, he is one of the few who didn't come from the jōnin-track. 

What they don't know is this: he failed the final graduation test on purpose.

"Morino Ibiki is a very smart man," he says conversationally, leaning against the doorway as his green eyes focus on his daughter, who does not even twitch.

Kazuko merely smiles at him while taking a bite out of her apple. She replies, "Of course. He is, after all, the head of the Intelligence Department."

Rookie of the year— such a title is gained from scoring the highest in the final examinations. Written tests, Taijutsu, Ninjutsu, Genjutsu and weapons. An old soul and young body she may have, but her mind hasn’t yet forgotten. (None have ever beaten her at Ninjutsu and Genjutsu either, but there is a Hyūga in her class and her thrown weapons never really were as good as her Kenjutsu.)

The Genin Corps is a very harsh place, and what kind of father would he be if he won't at the very least help his child reach far?

"Training would start tomorrow, at 0500 hours," he says, already walking away, "Do not be late."

Kazuko blinks owlishly with a tilt of her head, only for her father to answer before she even formulated her question.

"His father was assigned to be my jōnin sensei before."

Black hair, blue eyes. Tomoko, Daichi knows, would have been proud. Still so young but already following in their footsteps.

It never really did matter whether you were in the jōnin track or the genin corps. For in the end, they bleed, they sweat, they cry all the same.

Kazuko was nine when she joined the genin corps, and that's okay.

  
.  
  


They offer her condolences.

She hears nothing but the sound of war: of screams and of deathly silence.

She turns to face the rocky mountains before she leans back and falls.

She grasps the branch below her then lets go, holding the next branch with a little more ease than earlier until each movement requires no thought; only stopping upon touching the snow-covered ground. She doesn't want any of their fake platitudes.

She wants—

  
  
  


...What  _ does _ she want?

Revenge is not it, nor will it ever be. Revenge is only for those who had wronged her dearest friends and for all the fond memories she has of Daichi, he had only been known as "chichi-ue" in words and not in heart or mind. The only one she would acknowledge as a father of sorts is most likely a few countries over and with no knowledge of her apparent rebirth.

_ Justice _ .

What is justice, though?

Is it a desire for the right to prevail and the wrong be punished?

.  
  
  


Years later, she sits on top of a corpse, her back upon the newcomer whose eyes are as red as the blood still wet on her blade.

Eyes of the same color roll on the ground.

A breeze makes her hair fly to the side, just as she stands and turns, sword in hand to block the kunai that aimed for her throat.

"He was mine to kill."

Kazuko Tachibana—jōnin, just as she was  _ before _ —smiles and tilts her head to the side. "Came here for revenge, did you?" She says, voice light, "You're wrong by the way. He was  _ mine _ to kill."

How old is the kid again? Sixteen? Seventeen?

Ah, like it even matters.

She jumps back, just as the floor detonates, taking along with it the corpse and the eyes. What a shame that the kid was able to jump away; killing him would be rather difficult at this point.

In her blood does war sing. 

"Come at me with all you have, traitor."

Only in battle does she fly.

.

"Kazuko"— a child of peace, she used to wish she was.

How ironic.

  
  
  
  
  


Why does she continue to fight?

Because she loves it.

She was born in the middle of a war; it is only right that she dies in the middle of a different one. Once more.

(And she does. Permanently, this time.)

Standing in the middle of a field of swords, she turns—

_ "Why're you just standing there, dummy? C'mere!" _

Konohagakure is not a home for her— it never was. Nor will it ever be.

Here, though, she is finally happy. 

  
.  
  


War is where she belongs, where she was raised; peace is only an illusion she forced herself into believing. 

She doesn't need either of them. 

Not anymore.

**Author's Note:**

> as with my other works, u can tell that dialogue is Very Hard for me. welp.


End file.
